


The Village Witch's Ginger Hero

by Minutia_R



Category: The Chronicles of Chrestomanci - Diana Wynne Jones
Genre: Gen, Queer Themes, The Folk, Unplanned Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-22
Updated: 2013-09-22
Packaged: 2017-12-27 07:00:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,483
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/975839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Minutia_R/pseuds/Minutia_R
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Julia and Janet discover romance novels--and Marianne discovers some consequences of freeing the Folk, the dangers of writing real person fic when you're an enchantress, and some things about herself that she hadn't known.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Village Witch's Ginger Hero

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Jenn_Calaelen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jenn_Calaelen/gifts).



> Thank you to my friendly neighborhood beta, dropsofviolet!

The trouble started, as it often does, with a box.

(The real trouble started earlier. Maybe even as early as the summer before last, when Cat had freed the Folk--or a thousand-odd years before that, when Marianne's family had hidden them away in the first place. But as far as Marianne was concerned, it started with the box.)

It was a brown cardboard box which had once been sturdy but had got battered over the years. One corner was worn away entirely and something lurid and pink showed through. It made a solid thump when Julia dropped it on a table in the playroom one afternoon.

Janet peered over her shoulder. "What do you suppose they are? Ancient tomes of Eldritch lore that man was not meant to know?"

Julia wrinkled her nose. "Dull. Daddy keeps _that_ stuff in his office, and he's welcome to it." She levered off the top, and blew away a good quantity of dust. Janet sneezed.

"Gosh," said Janet. "There must be a hundred of them in there. Where'd you get it?"

Marianne had been trying to work on her magic homework. It was Wednesday, which meant they had off from lessons. But it was embarrassing to grow up in a family of witches and use magic all your life, to be whisked away for special schooling because your magic was just that special and powerful--and then in formal training to always find oneself behind Julia and Roger, who were only middling sorts of witches. As Mr. Saunders was always reminding her, leaving her to fill in, _They can do it, what's your excuse?_ for herself.

She snorted and shut her workbook. Let Mr. Saunders go hang, anyway. She looked over at the box, and had to blink at the colors--pinks and oranges and electric blues, writing in curly script with embossed gold letters.

It was tomes, or at least books. More than a hundred, just as Janet had said, slim paperbacks in neat stacks, the box jammed full of them. They all had titles like _The Dragon Emperor's Wily Maiden_ , and underneath the titles, women and men falling out of the most outlandish clothing to embrace passionately, or at least improbably.

"Mummy nixed Cat and Klartch's latest project--something about recording the natural resonances of--I don't know," Julia was explaining. "But anyway, they broke into her closet to get their equipment back, and they found this." She snickered. "It wasn't what they were looking for."

"But if Cat knows you've got it, won't he tell?" said Janet. "He's starting to take this next-Chrestomanci thing awfully seriously."

"He can't, not without getting himself and Klartch in trouble too." Julia brandished _Untamed Slave of Passion_. "Besides, can you imagine Cat saying a word about this? To anyone?"

“Well. No . . . .” Now Janet hesitated, clearly feeling bad about taking advantage of how easy Cat was to embarrass.

Marianne couldn’t stand how Janet sometimes treated Cat like he was made of glass. “Give it here, Julia. I’ll read it.” Julia held on to the book, pursing her lips. “And if you say I’m too young _I’ll_ tell. _I_ wasn’t rooting around in Millie’s closet.”

“I was going to give it to you anyway,” said Julia, handing Marianne _Untamed Slave of Passion_ and looking through the box for another for herself. “See, Janet? Some people have sense.”

“Just a peek couldn’t hurt, could it? Now that we’ve got them and all.” Janet frowned into the box. The book she came up with featured a young lady whose bright pink dress clashed hideously with both her red hair and purple eyeshadow. " _An Heiress in Paris_ ," she said doubtfully. "Who comes up with these titles?"

Marianne shrugged and opened _Untamed Slave of Passion_.

_"No!" Kallyndra stamped her delicate foot and shook back her raven tresses, an adorable pout pursing the corners of her blood-red, cupid's-bow lips. Angry tears glittered in her sapphire orbs. "I will not marry that brute!"_

Marianne goggled. She was, she knew, as much of a beginner at writing as she was at state-approved magic, but even she was pretty sure you weren't supposed to use an adjective or two for every noun like that.

"Oh, listen to this!" Janet called. " _He kissed her again, roughly, and she struggled feebly in his arms as he tore impatiently at the laces of her corset, his hands tangled in the fiery fall of her unbound hair_ \--how many arms has he got, anyway?"

"Shhh," said Julia wetly around a peppermint. "Reading."

Marianne flipped forward to see if there was anything like that in _Untamed Slave of Passion_. There was. Punishing kisses, breathless struggles, strange warm feelings pooling deep within loins, turgid manhoods, soft yielding, secret places . . . was that how it was all supposed to work? Marianne had got the basics of sex straight years ago--Mum had no patience for parents who told their children that babies came from the stork--but this was something else. She held the book higher to hide her blush, and kept reading.

It wasn't . . . it wasn't very good, was the thing. It wasn't just the constant dripping rain of adjectives, or the way the author would lose track of whose hands had gone where in the middle of a passionate scene, or even the fact that the heroine's name was Kallyndra and the hero's name was Blaeyke. It was the way that Kallyndra was supposed to be spirited, but she only ever acted soppy and useless. It was the way that Blaeyke and Kallyndra got angry with each other about the stupidest things, and instead of talking to each other stomped off crying (or stormed off brooding in his case). They didn't even seem to like each other, but every other chapter there were stirring loins or overheated declarations of love.

And the love scenes themselves--Janet laughed at them, and Julia apparently found them absorbing, but Marianne practically had to read the first few through her fingers out of sheer embarrassment. By the fourth one, though, she found herself skimming, looking for the next inexplicable temper tantrum or unnecessarily loving description of ballgowns. Blaeyke and Kallyndra were really just going through the same set of motions over and over, with the same high-flown and euphemistic prose. It was worse than embarrassing--it was boring.

She stuck it out through the end of _Untamed Slave of Passion_. It was hard for Marianne not to finish a book once she'd got fairly started, and it was a quick enough read, at least. When she was done, she was surprised to see how little daylight there was left. She asked Janet if she could borrow her bicycle for a ride around the grounds, and Janet mumbled her agreement without looking up from _The Sorcerer's Merry Widow_.

On Thursday and Friday and Saturday, Janet and Julia continued to go through the box of romance novels like a school of piranhas through a cow. (A school of piranhas, Roger had informed them all, could skeletonize a cow in five minutes. Janet had backed him up on this, although she thought the river that piranhas lived in was called the Amazon.) Marianne borrowed _The Champion’s Filly_ from Julia and didn’t even mind the pitying, I-knew-you-were-too-young-but-I-didn’t-like-to-say-so expression that Julia gave her along with the book. Marianne had never been horse-crazy but she’d take a dashing stallion over Blaeyke any day.

On Saturday evening, Millie gave Marianne and Joe a ride back home, as she did most Saturday evenings. This was good because Millie got on so well with everyone that Mum and Dad usually didn’t manage to start in on the snippy comments and meaning silences until about half an hour after she left, by which point Marianne had usually managed to escape to her own room.

“At least you still have your own room,” said Joe gloomily, poking at the odd-shaped bits of wood and broken or seldom-used tools that had been taking up more and more space in Marianne’s room ever since she and Joe had gone to study at Chrestomanci Castle.

“Or I would if I didn’t have an annoying older brother hanging around,” said Marianne. “They could hardly have put Duncan in my room, could they?”

Duncan was Dad’s new apprentice; he’d come about a year ago from the technical school over in Hopton. The cat had been out of the bag about the Pinhoes’ witchcraft for months by that point, and as Dad said, “It’s easier to get a carpenter and teach him witchcraft than to take a witch and make a carpenter out of him.” This, with a glare at Joe. Which was funny, because Joe wasn’t strictly speaking a witch. Mr. Saunders was sure he’d get his sorcerer’s certification if only he’d revise for the exam—though it could be that Joe had too much practice in being a disappointment for that.

Duncan was about Joe's age, but much keener. He'd had, at first, the most horribly old-fashioned and embarrassing ideas about marrying the master's daughter, but he'd got over those quickly, thank goodness! Marianne didn't really mind him after that. Joe still treated him like someone who'd come to the door selling the newest formula of cleaning solution and yet hadn't bathed recently. It didn't matter that Joe had never wanted to take over the carpenter's shop from Dad, or have anything to do with Pinhoe magic--Joe claimed he just hated the way Duncan had taken over half of his room. Which might have been true. Joe had always been very protective of his space and his things.

"Go on, then," said Marianne, since Joe had made no move to leave her room. "Duncan will be in the shop until suppertime--you don't want to miss your chance to unpack without him nosing through everything."

"Right," said Joe, and slouched off at last. Really, Joe was much more likely to nose through Duncan's things than the reverse. He didn't have anything like the respect for other people's possessions that he did for his own. He'd once told Marianne that Duncan kept a lock of black hair tucked in with his miniature of his light-haired mother--to be fair, that had been a piece of information Marianne had been glad for, at the time.

Now she was only glad that Joe was gone, and she could write without interruption. She sat down at her desk, took out her notebook and pen, and skimmed what she'd written last week, looking for inspiration.

And that was when the trouble got worse. Marianne hadn't liked _Untamed Slave of Passion_ , but she found herself thinking about it as she reread the scenes with Princess Irene and her cockney prince, and as it turned out, the prince was--well. Amiable. Dull. It wasn't that he and Irene didn't like each other, but--Marianne chewed the end of her pen and scowled at what she'd written, unsatisfied. And a sudden possession taking hold, she began to write.

_Salamander, Princess Irene's orange tabby, pelted down the back stairs of the castle. Irene ran after him. She hadn't even taken the time to change her slippers, and the rough ground near the stables tore at her feet as her breath burned in her lungs. Finally, Salamander stopped, and Irene almost collided with a tall, cloaked figure._

_The figure's cloak was embroidered in deep shades of twilight, and the eyes that looked out from the depths of the hood were a clear, piercing gray. Princess Irene tried to catch her breath, and couldn't. She felt like a butterfly stuck through with a pin by that gaze, and she longed to know all the secrets behind it._

_"Who are you?" she said. She'd meant it to come out a challenge--this was her castle, after all--but she could hear the breathy wonder in her own voice._

_"Princess Irene," said the figure, in meltingly rich tones._

Here Marianne stopped. Who was the figure anyway?

_~~"I am the exiled Duke of~~ _

_~~"I am the man that~~ _

_~~He held out his hand to her.~~ _

_~~He~~ _

None of it was right. Mum’s voice from below, calling that it was time for supper, came almost as a relief. Marianne put her notebook back in its drawer and went.

Dad and Uncle Richard and Duncan were already there, scrubbed and clean after coming in from the shop, though Dad still smelled like linseed oil when Marianne hugged him. Uncle Richard squeezed her arm, and Duncan ducked his head and said, “Hi, Marianne,” from behind his sandy fringe. It was like once he’d crossed her name out under “future wife” he couldn’t figure out where she fit.

Supper was pleasant enough; Dad and Uncle Richard talked shop and Mum talked herbs and local gossip, and Joe didn’t try to pick a fight with anyone. No one even grumbled about That Castle or enchanters or people getting above themselves--they saved all their complaints for tourists who’d come around Midwinter, hoping for glimpses of elves and fairies.

“Wouldn’t know the Folk if one bit them in the arse,” was Joe’s opinion.

Mum didn’t even bother to correct his language. “Three months, and we’ve only now got clear of them. Left the Pinhoe Arms a right mess, Arthur says.”

“It’s custom,” said Marianne. “And don’t they buy a lot of your medicines?”

“They don’t even care what they do! They’re just mad for herbs.”

“At least our Duncan has more sense,” said Dad.

Uncle Richard grinned slyly. “Went to the woods on Midsummer with the rest of them, though. Didn’t you, lad?”

“Once.” Duncan turned scarlet. “It was just . . . silliness.”

“You’ve got that right,” said Dad.

Joe muttered under his breath, “Scared?”

“Of course not! Why should I be frightened of--of fairy stories?”

“No arguments at supper, boys,” said Mum, and the meal was quieter after that. But Duncan, Marianne realized, was lying. Something was frightening him--the sort of secret nervousness you can live with for quite a while. She recognized it like an old friend, but it wasn’t her problem now.

She went upstairs to her room and lingered at her writing desk for a moment. Then she very deliberately put out the light and went to bed without opening the drawer.

Marianne woke up in confusion. She couldn’t quite remember what she’d been dreaming, but she had the awful suspicion that it had involved full lips and heaving bosoms--she was still breathless. Or no, that was Nutcase sitting on her chest.

“You empty-headed cat,” Marianne grumbled. It was still dark--what time was it? “You live at Woods House again, remember?”

Nutcase twitched his tail impatiently and kept staring into Marianne’s face. She shoved at him, but he went about a hundred stone heavy. “All right, I’m getting up. If you’re just begging for scraps, I swear--”

But Nutcase didn’t even pause in the kitchen. Marianne pulled a coat on over her nightgown and followed him out into the chilly spring night. It soon became clear that they were headed to Woods House. Marianne almost turned around and went home again--she could hardly knock on the door at, what was it, three in the morning?--but Nutcase led her into the garden, and there, kneeling in the dirt, was Jason Yeldham. In the light of the quarter moon, she could see that his arms were smeared with dirt to the elbows and his face was haggard. And she could feel the remains of some fearsomely strong spell fizzling out into nothing.

She felt horribly awkward. She’d never been head-over-heels for Jason like Janet and Julia had, but what do you say when you stumble into someone casting spells in his garden in the middle of the night?

“Marianne!” Jason said, wiping a hand across his face--which did nothing for the cleanliness of either hand or face. “I’m sorry--did Nutcase really get you out of bed for this? I don’t know why he thought you could help.”

“Help?”

Jason hung his head. “Irene’s gone. I was working late at the Castle, and when I came back, there was no sign of her. Jane James said she thought Irene had gone to help me--she’d seen her talking to someone in an outlandish cloak--”

“In a what?” Marianne yelped. The mysterious figure from her story, spiriting the real Irene away?

“And she thought, where else would a person like that come from but the Castle? But it wasn’t. And none of the usual locating spells work.”

“Maybe,” said Marianne, feeling wretchedly responsible and quite unable to say anything to Jason about it, “maybe I _can_ help. Pinhoe magic works sometimes when Castle magic doesn’t, you know.”

It was a measure of how helpless Jason must have been feeling that he looked appealingly at Marianne and said, “Would you? I don’t suppose it could hurt.”

“I’ll need a kitchen knife. The herbs,” Marianne said, and waved her hand at the garden, “I think I can find.”

By the time Jason came back with the knife, Marianne had already arranged a circle of leaves and berries on the surface of an ornamental sundial. She set the knife in the center of it and spun it around. Then she bit her lip. “That’s odd. She seems to be quite near."

"I looked--"

"I know." The knife was pointed straight at the gate in the lilac hedge. Unlike the rest of Woods House, that gate had never been fixed up; it still hung precariously on its hinges, and nearly all the paint had flaked off. The trees in the wood beyond soon hid the moon and stars. It was very dark, but Marianne could almost name the trees and plants as they walked past, by touch and by scent and by some other, less definable sense. At a particular holly bush, Jason stopped.

"She was here," he said, "but--it's the Folk, isn't it? I hate to do it, but we'll have to call--"

"No, don't," Marianne interrupted. They were far enough from the Castle that Chrestomanci wouldn't appear at a casual mention of his title, but Marianne had been raised to be cautious and she saw no reason to stop now. And she really didn't want to explain to Julia's dad how she'd come to summon up a tall, handsome stranger to carry Irene off. "I mean," she went on, casting about for excuses, "he may be the most powerful enchanter in the Related Worlds, but he hasn't had much experience with the Folk, has he? Their pride can be touchy, and you know how high-handed he gets, and if they were to take offense . . . ."

"Right," said Jason. Either Marianne was more convincing than she'd thought, or Jason was also glad of an excuse not to call Chrestomanci out of bed and tell him he'd misplaced his wife. "Lead on, then. We can always call him if things get sticky later."

Marianne nodded before it occurred to her that Jason couldn't see it. But she could feel his hand on her shoulder, and Nutcase close by her legs as she stepped forward.

The world of the Folk and the world of humans weren't as separate as they'd been two years before, but there were still places--and the holly bush was one of them--where you could end up in quite different places, depending on how you walked. A few more steps brought Marianne to a grassy clearing that you wouldn't have found on any map. The edge of the sky was pink, as if with dawn--it never got fully dark here, or fully light.

Jason and Nutcase were gone. They hadn't been able to follow her after all. Marianne felt small and foolish--why should she think that she'd be able to get Irene back by herself?--but also certain that Irene was nearly close enough to touch. Behind her she could hear women's voices and the weak cries of a very small baby. Turning around, she found that the white gravel path beneath her feet led to a bower among the trees.

A tall figure in a cloak embroidered in deep shades of twilight stepped up to meet her. The hood of the cloak was thrown back, and falls of black hair framed a face with clear, piercing gray eyes. Marianne's breath caught--this lady of the Folk was more beautiful than anyone she'd ever seen.

Marianne stared at her in despair, unable to believe what an idiot she’d been. Of course none of what she’d written about the mysterious figure had been right--how could she not have realized it was a woman? How could she have felt so superior to Janet and Julia and their crushes on Jason when she herself had been mooning twice as much over Irene? And this was the result of it!

“Dwimmer-woman,” said the lady of the Folk, inclining her head slightly. “I am queen in this place; you may call me Tarn. What is your purpose here?”

Marianne bowed deeply in return. Then she squared her shoulders and lifted her chin. “I’ve come for Irene, Queen Tarn. You had no right to take her.”

"Marianne!" It was Irene's voice, and Marianne rushed forward. She meant to throw her arms round Irene in sheer relief, but stopped short, suddenly shy. Irene was wearing one of the long white smocks she sometimes wore in the studio, and her hair was damp with sweat and coming loose of the sensible ponytail she'd had it in. Her sleeves were rolled up, there were smudges on her hands--was that blood?--and she looked utterly exhausted. Marianne felt so glad to see her she was giddy with it. How could she have thought Tarn more beautiful?

"Queen Tarn didn't take me, love," Irene went on. "She asked for my help. Her daughter was having a difficult birth."

Now Marianne took in the rest of the scene in the bower. These were the sort of Folk who looked almost human, but more delicate and insubstantial, and each of them had some non-human attribute--one had a short, blunt beak where her nose and mouth should have been, another had ram's horns curled close to her head, and cloven hooves instead of feet. The were all hovering around a girl about Marianne's age who was lying back in something like a bed or a swing woven of branches, vines and flowers. This girl looked twice as frail as any of them, pale as the moon. Her hair was silky black, even that part of it which wasn't hair at all, but a pair of dog's ears, long and curly-furred as a spaniels'. The baby she held to her breast wasn't crying now, but suckling vigorously. It was spindly and red like any other newborn baby Marianne had seen, and seemed more solid than the rest of the Folk--solid enough to suck the life out of its mother.

"But . . . but you're a painter." It was all Marianne could think of to say.

"I'm also Gammer Pinhoe." Irene sighed. "It seems . . . there's more involved in the position than I realized when I took it on. I've had to learn a lot, in the last two years. Your mother's been a help."

Everyone in Ulverscote and Uphelm and as far as Helm St. Mary's came to Mum to patch up their scrapes and dose their sniffles, but she didn't do births, did she?

But Gammer--Marianne suddenly knew that Gammer had. With grumbles and muttering about girls who were no better than they should be, with very little kindness, but if there was a girl in trouble, Gammer would have gone. A human girl. Not a girl of the Folk.

Not that that was here or there at the moment. "So . . . it was a misunderstanding?" Marianne didn't feel half so foolish as she felt relieved. "If you're finished, we should go home. Jason's worried."

"Oh, dear, Jason." Irene turned to Tarn. "I'm sorry, Queen Tarn, but I forgot to leave a note for my husband; he must be frantic, and I should go . . ."

"I'm sorry as well, Gammer," said Tarn. "But no one leaves my realm without my permission. And I do not give it."

"What?" cried Marianne.

"But why?" said Irene. "What reason do you have to keep us?"

Tarn waved an elegant hand at Marianne. "The enchantress may go the way she came, as she chooses. But you are Gammer Pinhoe. You speak for the humans in their dealings with the Folk. And there must be an accounting for this. Why do you imagine Dog-Rose's birth was so difficult, that she needed the help of a human midwife?"

"The father," Irene said. "He's human, isn't he?"

"So ask an accounting from him!" said Marianne. "It's not Irene's fault!"

The ladies of the Folk made way as the queen bent low over her daughter, smoothing the hair from her forehead. Dog-Rose's eyes met Tarn's and focused, feebly. "My daughter," said Tarn, "who is the father of the child you hold?"

"Me myself," whispered Dog-Rose.

A worried crease appeared between Irene's eyebrows. "She won't name him?"

"She cannot." Tarn straightened up, one hand still on Dog-Rose's shoulder. "That is the name he gave her. It's an old trick--but Dog-Rose is young, and it is long since our kind have had to deal with human tricks."

"Then if I tell you who the father is," said Marianne, "you'll let Irene go?"

"Marianne--" said Irene.

Tarn loosed Dog-Rose's shoulder and swept avidly over to Marianne. "You can do this?"

"Queen Tarn," said Marianne, "I can."

They left Tarn's realm by a way Marianne didn't know; Tarn on a horse as black as midnight, Dog-Rose and the baby in a litter carried by four of Tarn's ladies, and Irene and Marianne trailing behind. Jason and Nutcase and the holly bush weren't there when they crossed into the human world, but the wood soon told Marianne where they were, and she led them all to Furze Cottage, scooped up a handful of gravel and tossed it at a window. Thank goodness, it was Duncan's annoyed face that looked out and not Joe's.

"Marianne, what's this foolishness--" he demanded sleepily. And then, "Mrs. Yeldham?"

"Come down here," said Irene. "We need to speak with you."

Irene was the head of the Craft in Ulverscote, and wherever Pinhoes were. Duncan came. His knees were shaking by the time he reached the back door, and Marianne almost felt sorry, but he also looked relieved, the way you do when what you’ve been dreading finally happens. Until he saw Tarn.

“Lady,” he said, his voice hoarse with wonder, “who are you?”

Tarn’s eyes flashed anger. Irene stepped quickly between them. “Duncan, this is Queen Tarn of the Folk. Marianne believes . . . you’ve been involved with her daughter. Dog-Rose.”

“I . . . I danced with a fairy girl, beneath a Midsummer moon,” said Duncan, and Marianne snorted. Whose innocence did he think he was protecting? Even she knew it took more than _that_. But Duncan turned to Irene desperately. “I didn’t think it was real!”

Irene raised a hand, and the litter-bearers stepped forward. Dog-Rose parted the curtains, struggling to sit up, and the baby started crying again. “It’s real, my lad,” she said.

“My God.” Duncan stood rooted to the spot. “Is that--am I--”

“You stupid boy!” Tarn swung down from her saddle, but still towered over Duncan, who cringed back. “Who else’s child could that large lump be? Bad enough bearing it almost killed my daughter, bad enough I must find a place for it at my court--if anyone’s life must sustain it, let it be yours!”

“No, Mother,” cried Dog-Rose feebly. “I have told you; I am strong enough. Me myself. I would ask a different price from this boy.” She beckoned to Duncan, imperious as her mother. “Come here.”

They spoke for a while, Irene and Tarn watching over them, until the sky grew pale with dawn and Marianne was blinking with exhaustion. Finally Tarn seemed satisfied. The Folk went back to the woods, and Irene to Woods House, and Marianne . . . hardly knew what she did.

She found herself still in her coat, lying in bed above the covers as unbearably bright light poured in the window. “If you want breakfast before church, you’d better be downstairs in five minutes!” Mum was calling.

Marianne groaned. She shucked her nightgown and pulled on her Sunday dress as fast as she could. Joe was waiting for her at the top of the stairs.

“You look awful,” he observed. “And Duncan’s nightshirt was muddy along the hem this morning.”

Marianne was too tired to glare. “I will tell you everything. Just shut up.”

They hung back behind their parents and Duncan on the way to church. Marianne did not quite tell Joe everything--she started with Nutcase coming to fetch her in the middle of the night--but she told him enough to to satisfy him, it seemed. At any rate, when she was done, he gave a grunt halfway between amusement and contempt. “So, at the end of seven years, he pays child support to hell?”

“Not funny,” said Marianne. “The Folk don’t have much use for money, anyway. Dog-Rose asked for a bed. For herself, and whatever lover she chooses in the future. It’s not a small project, even the carpentry side, and as for the magic . . . you put yourself into magic, don’t you? Duncan won’t be kissing any girls on Midsummer eve, not for a while after it’s finished, Irene says.”

“Huh!” said Joe.

“And you are not to say a word about it, to Duncan or to anyone else.”

They stared at each other for a few seconds. Joe dropped his gaze first, sulkily. He wouldn’t be telling anyone. But that was just because Marianne was an enchantress and Joe was just a sorcerer. They filed into church and took their seats at the family pew, with Marianne feeling thoroughly disgusted with herself.

She kept nodding off during Reverend Pinhoe’s sermon. She certainly would have got a flaming telling-off from Mum, if Irene hadn’t accosted them at the church door. She looked awful, too, leaning heavily on Jason, her great blue eyes looking bruised. “May I borrow Marianne for tea, Cecily?”

“Well, all right,” said Mum. And then, more warmly, “Did you know, another two chemist’s shops in London have started to stock my medicines? Apparently they just fly off the shelves with the labels you designed!”

So Marianne made her escape to Woods House, sandwiched in between Jason and Irene. Jason wouldn’t stop thanking Marianne for bringing Irene back from fairyland. Marianne was completely flustered.

“Didn’t you set him straight?” she asked Irene.

“I certainly did,” said Irene. “You’re my hero.”

She had apparently told the same thing to Jane James, because there was an enormous plate of biscuits waiting for them in the kitchen. Irene shooed Jason out with the excuse of “girl talk,” and Marianne took a deep breath which smelled of butter and cinnamon and wasn’t nearly as steadying as she’d hoped.

“I’m not a hero,” Marianne said. “You don’t understand--I was selfish, and thoughtless--as bad as Duncan, really.” She found herself clutching her notebook, which she must have conjured from her desk without meaning to. Without any more words, she handed it over to Irene.

Irene flipped to the last written-on pages, her eyes widening as she read. “Marianne--” she said gently.

“And don’t say it’s only a story! I put magic into it.”

“Well, of course you did,” said Irene. “Magic is part of you. Don’t I put magic in my paintings? It’s true, an enchantress’ magic is a rare kind of power. But there are other kinds of power, and some of them--” Irene’s mouth twisted wryly-- “are quite common. As you saw. Any power can be the power to harm, and it’s good that you’re thinking about it, but--you haven’t harmed me yet.” She closed the notebook and gave it back to Marianne. “There, have I dispensed wisdom like a proper Gammer?”

Marianne laughed. “No, that would be more like--go put the kettle on, Marianne, and fetch us some biscuits. Don’t slouch! That dress is a disgrace--hasn’t your mother learned to press clothes yet? Now show us what you’ve been learning from Those People at That Castle. Huh! Very pretty, if you can call it magic, though I don’t.”

Irene laughed too. Irene’s laugh was a miracle like a bird taking flight; it lifted the weariness from her face and made everything shine, and Marianne blurted out, “You’re beautiful.”

At first Irene looked surprised, and then she looked . . . pleased. An ordinary sort of pleased, like Marianne had given her an ordinary sort of compliment, and not said something strange and wrong. “Thank you, Marianne,” she said.


End file.
